1964 Oldsmobile Super 88

Marty Titus of New Milford, Conn. owns a 1964 Oldsmobile Super 88. It's a four-door hardtop in sky blue that he bought eight years ago. He shares it in My Ride...

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BY BUD WILKINSON | REPUBLICAN-AMERICAN

Marty Titus of New Milford wasn’t hunting for a vintage automobile when he bought his 1964 Oldsmobile Super 88 some eight years ago. “It was just happenstance. I wasn’t particularly looking for an Oldsmobile. I wasn’t even particularly looking for a car at the time,” he recalled in explaining how the hefty four-door hardtop ended up in his garage.

“A friend of mine told me about it. He was working on the car for the owner and the owner put it up for sale because he collects big, four-door cars and he had to make more room in his barn. I went down and looked at it. It was sitting by the side of Route 7 in New Milford. It was kind of really dirty and cruddy looking,” he said.
The owner was apparently anxious to sell. “He says, ‘Here’s a license plate. Take it home and show it to your wife and see what she thinks.’ So, I brought it home, I went inside and I said to my wife, ‘Honey, look at the car. I got it out in the driveway.’ She says, ‘Does it run?’”

Titus took his wife, “Nickey,” for ride. She liked it and he called the owner and bought it. All he had to do was return the plate. “It was OK. It looked good once I cleaned it up and got all the dirt off of it. It shined up really nice,” Titus said.

The Super 88 certainly reflects the era in which it was built, especially the sky blue color. “You don’t see too many this color. It wasn’t a very popular color. In ’64, (General Motors) only used it on Buick, Oldsmobile and Pontiac. They didn’t use it on Chevrolet or Cadillac,” he said.

That Titus bought a GM product isn’t surprising. His first car as a teenager was a 1962 Chevrolet Bel Air station wagon, handed down by his father. “I just always had a thing for General Motors cars. Engines were easy to work on. Pretty trouble free,” he said.

The irony of the acquisition is that he worked 30 years as a mechanic for Southworth Chrysler-Plymouth.
Marty Titus hadn’t planned on becoming a car mechanic. Carpentry was his goal when he enrolled in Henry Abbott Technical High School in Danbury, but he quickly found auto shop to be to his liking. He graduated in 1968 and worked for a Pontiac dealer for a year before spending three years in the army. Upon discharge, he went back to the Pontiac store moving to Southworth Chrysler-Plymouth.

His background gives him an advantage over most vintage car owners. When it comes to maintaining and fixing the 1964 Oldsmobile Super 88, he does “the majority of it, unless I need a lift for it,” he said, reporting that he did have to use a friend’s lift to install air shocks in the rear.

Back in the 1960s, the Oldsmobile’s “88” line was its most popular, just below the full-sized flagship “98” model. Nonetheless, by today’s standards, it’s a behemoth. “It has a 394-cubic-inch V8 rated at 360 horsepower. This was the last year for this motor. It has regular AM radio. It’s all tinted glass. The glass is all original. Interior is all original. It has a six-way power front seat, but no power windows. The windows still crank up and down,” he said.

On the road, it’s a smooth mover thanks to a 123-inch wheelbase and the huge engine. By comparison, a new Buick Lacrosse only has a 114-inch wheelbase and a 220 cubic inch engine. “A lot of cars nowadays are half the size of this car and they ride like it,” said Titus.

The Super 88 “drives great. Typical GM steering. It’s very light on the steering wheel, and it does have power steering. No effort required,” he said.

One particularly noticeable aspect of the Super 88 is the spacious rear seat that appears to be in nearly showroom condition. “I don’t think it was ever sat in,” said Titus, who suggested that it may have been covered in plastic for many years.

He doesn’t hesitate to drive the Super 88. In eight years, Titus has put 16,000 miles on the odometer. Knowing how to fix it if something goes wrong no doubt curbs any anxiety.